School board to ask feds for help with Lamarque

Sarasota County will ask theCenters for Disease Control and Prevention to visit the North Port elementary school and review the air-quality test results

GABRIELLE RUSSON

After months of parent and teacher complaints about strange health symptoms at Lamarque Elementary in North Port, officials said they are seeking the federal government's help.

Superintendent Lori White said she is asking the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to visit Lamarque, review the air-quality test results that have been completed and recommend any tests the district might have overlooked.

White gave the update during a School Board meeting Tuesday on the North Port elementary, a perplexing problem since the $26 million school first opened in 2006.

For years, the district investigated an intermittent odor in classrooms. Once the rotten odor disappeared entirely last school year, staff and students' complaints about allergy-like symptoms, nosebleeds, headaches and dizziness emerged.

"We are concerned about the symptoms some staff and students continue to report, but we are at a loss to take action when many of the staff and students appear to be suffering no adverse effects from occupying the building," White wrote in a Jan. 14 letter to Tom Higginbotham, environmental health director from Florida Department of Health's Sarasota County office.

"Our only immediate remedy is to allow those staff and students who are affected to transfer to other schools."

Nine students have transferred to other elementaries in North Port, said district spokesman Scott Ferguson.

About 881 students attended Lamarque in November, according to previous enrollment figures.

White continued in her letter, "Because we appear to have reached the limits of our available expertise without resolving the problem, I would like to ask the CDC to help us ..."

After spending thousands of dollars on tests, school officials have said they do not believe Chinese drywall has contaminated the building.

Earlier this month, about a dozen parents and grandparents argued with school officials during a Jan. 7 night meeting that escalated into a shouting match.

Tuesday's afternoon meeting was much calmer.

North Port resident Charles Hummer, who created a YouTube video on Lamarque, was the only one who spoke out. He asked, again, that the district close the school.

"I have a passion and that's to save the children at the Lamarque Elementary school," Hummer said. "I wish the School Board shared the same passion."

North Port meeting promised

Looking back, board members said the tensions were high on Jan. 7 because parents mistakenly thought the meeting was called to address the Lamarque situation. Instead, it was a regular board meeting, and parents sat in the audience for more than an hour during lengthy presentations.

Board member Carol Todd called it "the perfect storm."

"We want to hear their concerns but there does need to be decorum at the meeting so we can hear their concerns," Todd said during a Tuesday workshop.

Board members pledged to hold a meeting in North Port to be closer to South County parents, but did not set a date. They also said they plan to regularly update the community by posting report findings to the district's website.

Also Tuesday, school officials heard sunny financial numbers, positive news they had not received since before the economic downtown.

The district is not expected to dip into its saving accounts to balance the projected $393 million budget for the 2014-15 year, marking the first time that has happened since the 2007-08 year, deputy chief financial officer Al Weidner told the board.

A major factor: The district plans to save about $1.2 million by replacing some retiring teachers with substitutes – a major cost-savings because they are paid less and don't get benefits.

Weidner warned, however, that his estimates are based on 5 percent growth on local tax rolls and 4 percent increase in state funding.

"The one big unknown is what the governor and the Legislature will do," he told White and the board members during a Tuesday afternoon workshop.

Even though Sarasota County schools' finances are considerably healthier than neighboring Manatee County, it has not been immune to budget cuts.

When schools opened this year, the high and middle schools no longer had media specialists working in the libraries. Instead, they were replaced by aides. And Phoenix Academy, a small school for students who struggled with academics in grades 8-10, closed its doors.

"What we will all love to see go away are those horrendous budgets at the end of the year," White said during Tuesday's workshop. "We will all celebrate."

In other news, the board approved a $400,000 deposit to cover the cost of the March 25 school referendum. The district is asking voters to renew a school tax to help fund school operations.

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